Join Jean Stern, Executive Director of the Irvine Museum and recognized authority on California Impressionism, for an engaging discussion of the premier paintings in the Museum's current exhibition, California Impressionism: Paintings from the Irvine Museum.

From the turn-of-the-century until the start of the Depression, painting in California was dominated by a remarkable artistic style that combined several distinctive aspects of American and European art. Commonly called California Impressionism or California Plein-Air Painting, this movement was concerned with the colors and the splendid light of the Golden State. Masterpieces of California Impressionism from the Irvine Museum, arguablly the most important collection of West Coast American Impressionism will be discussed. The Irvine Museum is the only museum in California dedicated to the preservation and display of California Impressionism.

Don't miss this rare opportunity to meet one of the most renowned authorities on the California Plein-Air movement!

Forty three pieces of extraordinary costume designs by London’s leading costumiers, Cosprop, will be featured in an exhibition at the Boca Raton Museum of Art from January 19 to April 17, 2011. The twelve-week long show will transport visitors to such places as opulent nineteenth-century Paris (The Phantom of the Opera) and twentieth-century colonial Shanghai (The White Countess).

Uma Thurman wore this lace dress as Charlotte Stant in The Golden Bowl (2000), Costume Design by John Bright

The costumes for the exhibition CUT! Costume and the Cinema focus on 1700 – 1900 era films, many of which will be on display at the Boca Raton Museum of Art. These award-winning costumes (BAFTA and Oscar among others) were created by designers John Bright, Jenny Beavan, Penny Rose, Michael O’Connor and more.

Lara Flynn Boyle wore this 21st century evening gown inspired by Christian Dior as First Lady in Land of the Blind (2006), Costume Design by Phoebe de Gaye

The exhibition will be laid out chronologically based on the time periods when the movies were set. Therefore, one could see an actor repeated in each subsequent 18th, 19th and 20th century’s costumes. For example, a Kate Winslet fan could find her costumes in the year 1800 as Marianne Dashwood in a simple cotton muslin dress for Sense and Sensibility and also the year 1903 as Sylvia Llewelyn Davies in a cream silk nightdress and robe inspired by the Arts and Crafts Movement for Finding Neverland.

Period dramas are adored for both the intricacy of their costumes as well as for the sheer multiplicity of costumes seen on-screen. Indeed, costume designer John Bright explains the costumier’s dilemma, “With the Golden Bowl we provided the lace and sequined dresses for the principle artistes. For Uma (Thurman) 28 outfits; Anjelica Huston had 15 and Kate (Beckinsale) 20. Of those we had to make about 25 and at least 3 of the costumes were very time consuming.”

Often, a costumier will have to imagine creative solutions to production problems such as an extremely limited budget. The famed Ivory-Merchant films often worked with small budgets but still managed to produce sumptuous settings, clothes, and props to suspend the viewers’ belief and transport them to a bygone era.

About the Merchant-Ivory films, Bright says “… the budget on their films is low so we have to get the costumes from stock. On Howards End we made some of Emma’s (Thompson) costumes, but others we just dyed and re-sorted out clothes to bring them into the concept we’d worked out. In most instances, it is relying on the real clothes that exist and pushing them around rather than starting from scratch.”

Visitors will get to see Bright’s handiwork on platforms that will circumambulate the gallery with small catwalks jutting off to highlight especially large costumes, such as Lara Flynn Boyle’s turn-of-the-21st-century gown from Land of the Blind.

So the question is… will the cinematic illusion of time travel stand up personal scrutiny? Let’s chat about it!

Local Art Classes Open House in Boca Raton for All Ages at The Art School of the Boca Raton Museum of Art

A lot of the fun of going to see an exhibition can come from the inspiring ideas that an artist gets when they see another’s work. I know that at Art Basel Miami Beach last week, a lot of people were discussing how they could utilize new techniques and materials they saw there, in their own work, which is why it is so valuable to have The Art School working in collaboration with the Boca Raton Museum of Art.

Open to the community, The Art School offers classes in all manner of fine arts disciplines:

3-D (assemblage, fiber art, collage, mixed media)

Drawing (children’s book illustration, fashion illustration, figure)

Jewelry (casting, fabrication, lapidary)

Painting (china & tile, encaustic, figure, portrait, watercolor)

Photography (camera basics, fine art, Photoshop,)

Sculpture (clay,stone, wheel-throwing)

Print (monoprint)

And many others…

This December 12th from 12:30 – 3:30 PM, The Art School will be hosting its Open House. You can come and meet the teachers and see examples of work from their previous classes.

The classes are quite affordable and many are taught by working artists who have earned their M.F.A. It is important that the teachers be active in their respective circles. For example, Susan Hanssen won The Gold Award from the Florida Watercolor Society for their 2010 exhibition.

Either beginner or professional can take part in one of the 100 weekly classes or lectures, as well as 40 weekend workshops. Lifetime learners and weekend warriors alike can benefit from the flexible schedule and broad spectrum of classes. The Adobe Photoshop classes are a special favorite of creative professionals looking to expand their repertoire.

In a nutshell, The Art School is a valuable facility that anyone can enjoy. The classes are small enough that an aspiring student can get the attention they need in a supportive atmosphere. Many students return year after year for both the opportunities provided and to become a part of the dynamic creative environment. There is no better place to learn about art opportunities than from the gossip of fellow artists!

Definitely stop by the Open House and rediscover the excitement of working alongside fellow creative minds, spark ideas and invigorate your creating side.

This lifelike sculpture that is normally installed next to the actual security guards’ office in the museum has traveled all the way to Baden-Baden, Germany. He isn’t seeking to claim a new position at the Museum Frieder Burda but rather was loaned to be part of the exhibition Duane Hanson/Gregory Crewdson: Uncanny Realities.

From November 27, 2010 to March 6, 2011, Security Guard will be part of a larger exhibition comprised of 25 Hanson sculptures and 20 Gregory Crewdson large-scale photographs that deal with “the human abyss.”

In conjunction with the stark, eerie photographs, the Hanson sculptures will create a dialogue about the American middle-to-lower classes and the “disappointments of the American dream that are buried within them.” Hanson’s unique ability to capture every imperfection in the sculpture’s physiognomy adds to the feeling of verité, therefore prompting a feeling of empathy on the part of the viewer.

Germany isn’t the first place that Security Guard has traveled. He’s been no slouch on the sightseeing front. Prior to the Boca Raton Museum of Art's exhibition, he visited the Albright-Knox Gallery of Art in 2004 for Bodily Space: New Obsessions in Figurative Sculpture, and the James A. Michener Art Museum in Doylestown, Pennsylvania from 2006 – 2007 for Duane Hanson: Real Life.

While Security Guard is in Germany enjoying the culinary delicacies and winter weather, the museum here in Boca will be filling our galleries with costumes from Cosprop, the London-based costumery for film, television, and theatre. CUT! Costume and the Cinema opens on January 18th 2011.

Mexican writer and Nobel Prize Laureate Octavio Paz writes about artist Valerio Adami in The Narrative Line, an essay included in the exhibition catalogue for the Boca Raton Museum of Art’s retrospective of Valerio Adami. Looking at Adami’s work as an exercise in line, narrative and color, Paz uses these 3 elements to help the reader better understand Adami’s paintings. Space is created through color, a story is created through the inclusion of text, and the line can teach us about time.

For instance, about space and color, Paz writes, “For Adami, colour cannot be separated from space. And so space is born out of his drawing. An unfelt transformation of the line, creator of spaces, into great blocks of colour.”

In terms of text in Adami’s artwork, Paz writes, “As an intelligent artist, Adami also writes. That is nothing unusual: writing is another art born out of silence. Naturally, he is not a professional writer; he writes on the margins of his painting, as a comment, or, more exactly, as an accompaniment…his notes are not an answer; but a way of approaching these paintings and hearing their question more clearly.”

Towards the end of his essay, Paz addresses line in Adami’s work, “Whether a poem, or a novel, whether a play or a review, every text is a succession of words; whereas the line is a succession of points, or rather, a succession of bridges between one point and the other. Time is linear, and, as it turns out, people have invented nothing better than a line for representing time. The forms drawn by Adami, with his unique, rapid and secure, free and elegant movement of his hand, are closed forms. Or, more exactly, forms closed in themselves. They talk among themselves and provoke within me an indefinable unease.”

Paz’s entry is one of many in the catalogue in praise of Adami’s use of line, color, and text to create intense canvases that stimulate both the mind and the eye. Other eminent writers included in the catalogue are: critic Dore Ashton, journalist Italo Calvino, essayist Carlos Fuentes, poet Alain Jouffroy, and academician Antonio Tabucchi. It is truly one of the Boca Raton Museum of Art’s most prolific compilations of writing.

What is a CVV Code?

CVV2 is a security measure for credit cards. Since a CVV2 number is listed on your credit card, but is not stored anywhere, the only way to know the correct CVV2 number for your credit card is to physically have possession of the card itself. All VISA, Discover, MasterCard and American Express cards made in America in the past 5 years or so have a CVV2 number. However Diners Club does not use a security code.

How to find your CVV2 number:
On a VISA, Discover or MasterCard, please turn your card over and look in the signature strip. You will find (either the entire 16-digit string of your card number, OR just the last 4 digits), followed by a space, followed by a 3-digit number. That 3-digit number is your CVV2 number.(See below)

VISA, Discover & MasterCard

On American Express Cards, the CVV2 number is a 4-digit number that appears above the end of your card number. (See below)